Internet Monopoly and Censorship

I can only promise for myself but if discussion bends towards reason, is presented in good faith and is at least relatively Linux / nerd related i’ll be grateful for the chance to listen and i’ll vouch for it. If it serves DLN with rich debate i’m all in.

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Amen. :v::heart::penguin:

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I have no interesting in using Gab for my own reason, but that is utterly just nonsense talk. Sounds like the same garbage CNN and MSNBC spewing.

It was created due to the ongoing problem with cancel culture and “wrong think” on those monopoly platforms banning anything they disagree with as “hate speech.” The censorship problem has even gotten worse within the past month.

The irony is, those calling who have been calling for censorship are now the ones starting to get censored now.

I disagree with that. Engagement is better for all.

Look what this one black guy did with open engagement

Sticking something in a hidden area of the internet does not make it go away.

Then look what ANTIFA does to him:

https://libertarianhub.com/2019/09/07/antifa-calls-a-black-man-who-has-de-radicalized-kkk-members-a-white-supremacist/

And places like Twitter allow their tweets to remain. So, who is really the white supremacy site?

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What are referring to? I’ve read the page you linked and found nothing unusual or alarming in any way.

Communities having their own rules about moderation isn’t issue of free speech though. Even blocking logins from gab in their application – while closest to the issue – doesn’t violate this right, because Mastodon has no power to do so. They can only influence their own products and users.

One could argue, that mastodon’s moderation rules are bad. Personally I wouldn’t block networks like gab completely, as I tend to be more libertarian when it comes to access to content and would rather for users to use their own filters while only blocking networks like gab in global feed.
There is however value in networks that do this kind of moderation, as many users prefer not check those sites personally and like having defaults that will do that for them.

Gab wasn’t as pro freedom, when the issue in question was something that owner of the platform was personally against – namely pornography.
He’s also posting about a lot of fake news about election fraud and shares posts such as
“I regret the [covid] deaths. I really do. But we’re all going to die someday. There’s no use fleeing reality. We have to stop being a country of fags… We have to face up to it and fight. I hate this faggot stuff.”
or
“LGBT agenda is Satanic” and “literally evil”.

As for antifa story, I don’t know what it has to do with Mastodon, but the post gives no source and the blog itself is filled with propaganda, such as baseless claims about election fraud, so I even if it was relevant to the topic, I cannot accept this as trustworthy source.

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Who wants to have pr0n show up on a site while at work, or with children around?

It’s fake according to who?

I hate quoting Wikipedia, but

Yes, so? Not entitled to their own opinion?

How about from the “Horse’s Mouth” so to speak, and how are claims about election fraud “baseless”? Do you have firsthand knowledge of this?

What is has to do with Mastodon? It has to do with with all the big tech sites. They allow ANTIFA racist attacks on people to stay, while deleting others for less insulting behavior.

I’m not going to delve examples much as it’s getting way off the beaten path but I agree, in no way does it explicitly state an agenda that oppresses minority groups.

In practice however, this vague form of terminology is frequently used as a suppression tool against dialog within these groups and against journalists across all ideological spectrums which is why it’s more than understandable that a lot of people don’t know about the problem unless they’re digging around for news diversity.

Providing one example, if a feminist expresses concern that biologically male trans women are erasing biological females from sports scholarships and reducing their desire to join sports over fairness and physical safety concerns… that’s almost exclusively considered hate speech and/or transphobia despite being a reasonable point of discussion among feminists.

Protected hate speech like “TERF” is used against feminists who raise this issue and vague language in terms/covenants are weaponised against them.

I didn’t bug anyone about this earlier but the claims about Gab really need citations to be useful.

Explicit images can merge with free speech territory arguably to a lesser or more degree but there’s always cross over. It’d be interesting where Gab places that line but I dare not ask :stuck_out_tongue:

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TERF isn’t a slur. It is literally an acronym for Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists, which is descriptive of these particular feminists.

Don’t start clowning. Instances of voter fraud in the USA is and has always been statistically insignificant. Claiming otherwise is straight lying.

Matt Stone and Trey Parker are not in a position to reclaim a word as they are not a part of that particular community. I get what the episode is trying to do but Matt and Trey can’t just decide that gay men should be okay with the repurposed language. It would be as if I used an ethnic slur and claimed it really means that a person is a hoopy frood.

Lastly, the “LBGT agenda” is about freedom and equality. Neither of those two things are inherently evil or “Satanic”. It’s not an opinion, it’s a statement made in bad faith.

Deflection, huh?

Then by that logic, then 1% of the population is not in the position to claim “marriage” is no longer defined as a man and a woman.

Now you are the one making a statement in bad faith. It’s his opinion.

Now you are start to sound just like those censors the OP was mentioning.

You know marriage equality has more support than 1% of the population right?

Come on.

No. It’s a fact. Do the legwork, look it up.

Oh no not the censors :scream:! No what I sound like is someone who doesn’t share your opinions.

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Who wants to have nazi symbolism show up on a site while work, or with children around?

Normally, not allowing porn on your platform is perfectly reasonable. But when you look at the gab’s response about the matter, it turns out that reason for this decision was founder’s religious believes – which again, by itself is totally fine.

What’s weird is how ones believes can lead to that strong of response against porn and at the same time, no response about open racism, misinformation and other awful things.

All judges who were presented with fraud cases.
Total lack of evidence.

That was a funny episode. Do you have an actual response though?

You seem to forget the reason why I quoted those, was to show that owner of the site has far right agenda. Which they do.

That is perfectly sufficient source. Thank you.

By definition “baseless” means there’s no evidence for it. I do not need to have firsthand knowledge as it’s person who makes the clam, that needs to provide evidence, for it to not be baseless.

As far as I can see, the fault was on the side of ANTIFA and police. This facebook post says nothing of big tech, so it isn’t the best example.
But I do have many problems with with big tech and there is evidence of them playing dirty. Such as this favoritism of right-wing content when removing fact-check warnings. This includes pages known for their inaccuracy, such as PragerU.

That’s quite big assumption from few fairly neutral words. But even if Mastodon doesn’t have this problem, there are communities who do, so it’s worth addressing anyway.

And discussion-wise I would agree. I think it’s better to allow such kind of points as long they are respectful and so on, because it allows all sides to get better understanding of the problem.

But there is another side to this as well. There are good reasons to not want such claims, for example many people are tired of of addressing the same points, which often attack their very being and facing too many of them is bad for their mental health.

So, while personally I would avoid communities having too strict rules and there are some which go too far even when taking protection of vulnerable members into account, I generally see place for most of them.

Asking for sources is good and I always encourage it.
In this case, it’s little bit problematic as the posts in question were posted on a twitter page that no longer exists (I was going from my memory), but I did found this youtube wideo which did record them when it was happening. First three minutes should be enough to confirm my claims.

Gender-critical feminism - Wikipedia
TERF Definition & Usage Examples | Dictionary.com
Urban Dictionary: TERF
TERF - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

The definition for it’s common use includes transphobia (irrational fear based reasoning) and/or that gender identity is illegitimate. The affix of “radical” also implies the beliefs are extreme.

All hate speech is descriptive. The difference is whether or not it’s used with the objective of negatively misrepresenting someone.

Irrational fear based thinking is a presumption and feminists that follow the example I made above make the case that biology and identity should be treated as two different things, not that gender identity is illegitimate.

@Ulfnic the feminists in question self identify as “radical feminists.” It isn’t added to the term as a way to extreme-ify their original positions.

I am reminded of an old meme.

Again, all speech including hate speech is descriptive. Given adequate contexts all speech can be accurate or even favorable. Even the N word can be used as a term of endearment in the right context and “retaking” words to reduce their power can be a valuable defensive strategy.

I agree the term TERF can be accurate depending on context and I have no doubt some people self identify under that label, perhaps even use it endearingly. Though I never made the case that was a problem.

The example I gave was a context in which the term TERF grossly misidentifies and is commonly used as a denigration and suppression tool.

Bringing it back to free speech, it illustrates the danger of vague social policies because they’re easily hijacked by negative misidentification which they give tremendous power to.

To your point @PatPlusLinux, I did present TERF as inherently hate speech in that first part which justifies all your points.

Well said, it’s complicated.

I’d also agree children need a trellise of good information to grow on and exposure should scale with adulthood. That’d be a parental choice.

The EFF did an interesting highlight on whether suppression in fact promotes those things but it’s certainly a debate point.

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Last add… speech is very much a FOSS issue because of contibutor agreements, terms of use, licensing, the spirit of FOSS and so on.

I’m skeptical if deep diving the US election serves Linux or DLN. Just try to remember why we’re all here.

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They are just symbols. We see them all the time. You don’t get "

Like this judge did?

Let’s give a hypothetical example. Outside there is a group of people, with no cameras to be found anywhere. Someone in a drives up in van, grabs a person in the crowd ,and drives off with them disappearing - a kidnapping. So 20 witnesses call 911 claiming a person has been kidnapped. Then the police say , but there is no proof! And the local news media is then proclaiming," Debunked! Without evidence, 20 people call 911 about a kidnapping. "

You are just dismissing witnesses then. In Detroit, we have images of the polling area hiding their counting by covering up windows? Why?

Even the BBC admits there are signs of fraud.

Too many voters – Many counties are reporting well over 100% voters. Not in in the AU where they have mandatory voting laws, still cannot even get 100%

Delay in announcing results - Many places just stopped counting. Why is that?

Just what “inaccuracy” is there?

I did. The facts that words change sometimes. The word “fag” comes from English slang word for a cigarette. I guess it got turned into a “negative” word probably because one puffs on them.

I can agree with that. I don’t think anyone is talking about not removing posts which are attacking people, but censoring when one side disagrees. If you have wrong think on Twitter, or Facebook, you are banned, or posts removed. That is why I closed my accounts on those.

That just one example of content gab has absolutely no problem with. Another one would be displaying violence and gore which are also not prohibited.
When arguing against pornography, gab gave need of age verification as one of the reasons, yet somehow the same problem doesn’t concern them when its any of other age inappropriate content.

I probably should be more specific with my wording. I was referring to the claims of mass scale fraud raised by Trump and his supporters after results of election.
This case was caught by the system before the results. We don’t even know which candidate did those votes favor, but either way it’s not part of any of cases raised by president. Also it happened in Texas, which Trump won anyway, so it doesn’t align with claims made by his fans.

You might not notice, but this article is from 2016. More importantly, it’s about Gabon – country in Africa. Do you even read the stuff you post?

Take this What They Haven’t Told You about Climate Change as an example.

First thing is the fact that they call themselves a “University”, which they are not and some people get confused by that, siting them as genuine scientific source and not just site with Youtube channel.

It falsely claims that current changes in climate are natural.
It claims that current changes are caused by Earth’s tilt and orbit, which is only true if he was talking about seasons.
It claims that another reason for the current changes is sun’s activity, which is stupid considering that this activity is falling over last 40 years and before that it was steady.
It claims that changes are caused by Milankovith cycles, which again is false as the process is well understood and doesn’t add to current raises of temperature.
It claims that there is no correlation between Earth temperature and CO2 levels, but completely ignores all other known factors, that affect the temperature – mainly effect of the sun.

Are you suggesting that in case we’re discussing – which to remember it is "(…) We have to stop being a country of fags… We have to face up to it and fight. I hate this faggot stuff.” – the word wasn’t used as a slur?

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@Kikuchiyo @Trent

A degree of politics is fine but this is not the right place for ongoing tit for tat over the U.S. Election.

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I usually do not engage in political discussions on the internet but one thing I have to get out and then I am out again.

Just wearing them in public or owning them is punishable by law in Germany and I think there is a good reason for that. I know in the US that is different.

*added for clarification

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